


in the sun i feel as one

by bigembarrassingheart



Category: My Own Private Idaho (1991)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canonical Character Death, M/M, Mutual Pining, Other characters mentioned - Freeform, Purple Prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-21
Packaged: 2020-07-10 05:48:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19900831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigembarrassingheart/pseuds/bigembarrassingheart
Summary: now the colours are soft and the fire is warm, but the night is cold and so is he.





	in the sun i feel as one

i  
lying in bed back to back

you’re lying in bed together, but he’s sitting up, and talking to someone. you can’t see them, your eyes are closed. he’s touching you, his hands are in your hair, but you’d wish he’d stop. it’s all just a game, he just wants to play a game, tell a convincing lie to convince his father to love him, and you can’t handle him touching you because it’s not real. and if it was, you don’t even know if you would want him to touch you, it might just feel like work. you just want to lie still, and free, and warm.

\----

it feels a little like a game to you, the kind where the stakes are high but you and him can’t stop laughing. but it’s all a part of your plan. you love him, you do, he’s your best friend, but it’s not the same and it can’t be. you need to please that man, to return and make him feel so guilty he’s accept you in whatever form you remain, but then you glance down at the boy in the bed with you, eyes closed tight, a smile only you would notice on his face, and you glance at the policemen being so loud and so hush-hush, ready to do anything, and you’re not sure what you want to do.

ii  
i have to find a bed that can take this weight

you don’t know what it is. your exhaustion, or feeling the warmth of the fire and the country after years of the city’s unique cold, or finally allowing yourself to think she might be close and you might be able to recreate your dreams - or hallucinations, or are they delusions? Whatever they are - in reality but finally happy, not lonely and twitching, but for a few seconds you feel hopeful. so you tell him. you’re sure he already knows, and he doesn’t recoil, he sighs and you’re looking at him and he’s looking at you. you let your gaze slide to his mouth, and you really want to kiss him but you know he’s going to say something.

\---

you’re looking at him as he stares blankly into the fire. you’ve been swept up in everything, action! adventure! giving him a chance at the normalcy you might finally grasp in only a week. , but now the colours are soft and the fire is warm, but the night is cold and so is he. the words out of his mouth are familiar, and god you feel so bad. you want to hold him, and stroke his hair, but there are things you want and things you Want, and you must remember the difference. so you try to reason with him, that’s something you can do when grandeur melts away, and his face, oh you want him to be okay. you want him to find her, and you want to find love from that man, and you want to be friends and you want nothing to change, but you know it’s impossible so you listen to him breathe until you fall asleep.

iii  
darling you break my heart each time you

you’re awake with boys speaking nonsense, and the brightest sun in your eyes, and he’s not there, and you already know it is a mistake. but then he appears, smiling and happy, and you want to follow him through galaxies, and you want to find her, and feel her arms around you, and he’ll be in your dreams. but when he sees the girl, his eyes change, and you want to cry but they’re always together and they’re always there, and all you can do is blow smoke in their food and then you’re gone bam! out like a light, and does he even care anymore? it crosses your mind that you will never see him again. maybe you’ll see a murderer, wearing his face, but you’ll never see him - joyous, genius, unplugging and lying and living - ever again. the planets go quiet.

\----

just another thing to add to your list of mistakes, but she’s not a thing or a mistake. she’s a vibrant spark and she likes you just enough and you feel bad but she’s not him and that’s all you need. so you let him slowly slip away like blowing smoke. when he collapses, you don’t think of holding him in your arms until he awakes. there’s an image you’ve always been expected to uphold, and you’re finally ready. you can finally stop thinking, about him, about how he never found her, about how he’s sleeping more and more, and if you were married he could see a doctor. no, all you see in the back of your eyelids is her, and you’ve stopped dreaming.

iv  
let this be the last song let all be forgiven

every part of you is broken like coffin teacups, and yet you’re still looking at him. he’s unhappy, stiff and poised. you’re unhappy, dancing and free. did you ever dance with him? you can’t recall, and you can’t cry. you’re chanting and screaming, and they’re all natural but you’re in chains. nothing can be okay ever again, you have even less than the little you started with. you wish for new familiar roads to finally fall asleep.

\----

you’ve killed a man. not really, but close enough. and then you see him, screaming and loose but losing, and you can feel his blood draining into your hands, feels pulse slow as you try to stay calm. it’s over. you have what you’ve been missing since you first opened your mouth and screamed at the injustice that is planet earth. there are others like you, but you are not like them. he is like you, and you are like him, and he loves you, and as the coffin falls from view, and he looks right at you and turns away, you love him.

v  
i'm just tired and bored with myself i could use a little help

you’ve been crying for a while now, and you’ve been walking for a while now, and you thought you’d be okay, but you saw him again, and you were right about it all - a murderer wearing the most beautiful face - and it all came back and you last saw him an hour ago but it feels like centuries. your brain is short-circuiting and you slowly fall and you close your eyes and you see him and it’s a blank slate. nothing matters except you’re in his arms and this isn’t feverish collapse but finally quiet peace.

\----

you see him, shoeless and asleep in your dreams. in your dreams this is it, the only road that matters. you kneel beside him and he’s gone but he knows, and you start to cry, and you pull him into the car and God’s never made anything perfect except for him, and all that’s ahead of you is a flat road and the sky.


End file.
